Category Archives: Architecture

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The Echo Arena entertainment venue together with the adjoining BT Convention Centre form ACC Liverpool (Arena and Convention Centre Liverpool). The centre was designed by London-based architects WilkinsonEyre and Bath-based consultants BuroHappold Engineering and opened in 2008 to host the official launch of the city’s European Capital of Culture year.

The £164 million centre is owned by Liverpool City Council and is operated by The ACC Liverpool Group Ltd.

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The Philharmonic Dining Rooms is a pub and restaurant located diagonally opposite Liverpool Philharmonic Hall. Designed by Welsh-born public-house architect Walter William Thomas (1849-1912) for Irish-born local brewer Robert Cain (1826-1907), ‘The Phil’ was built in 1898 as a gentleman’s club. Renowned for its ornate interior decoration, the Grade II* listed building is now part of the Nicholson’s chain of hostelries.

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Plans for the 7.8-hectare Menai Science Parc (M-SParc) were submitted in December 2014 with Anglesey Council granting outline permission in May 2015. The Welsh Government provided £10 million of funding with a further £10 million grant from the EU’s European Regional Development Funding allowing the first phase of the development to proceed. Construction started in 2016.

The flagship building, one of a planned total of eight on the park, was designed by Newcastle-based architects FaulknerBrowns and will provide 5,000 square metres of office, laboratory and workshop space to a number of business tenants. It is planned to open in April 2018.

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In April 2012 the derelict Ashgrove House in Loanhead was featured here in this blog. It was mentioned then that the listed 18th-century villa was at the heart of an area of former green-belt land that was the subject of a planning application for a housing development.

Things have moved on since then. In November 2014 there was a major fire at the property, which was brought under control by 39 firefighters. In August 2015 Midlothian Council granted planning permission to Straiton Park Limited for the demolition of the ‘dwelling and bothy’ at Ashgrove.

The first phase of the ‘Mayburn Park’ housing development by CALA Homes is now complete, with continued construction currently moving towards the grounds of the former Ashgrove House from the northwest and Taylor Wimpey’s new ‘Ashgrove Fields’ housing estate lies immediately to the southeast. A planning application for the ‘erection of 92 dwellinghouses’ on the land of the former villa was lodged with the Council in December 2015, but was withdrawn in August 2016.